Hyundai's Luxury Move
2008年01月08日13:24
韩国最大的汽车制造厂商现代汽车公司(Hyundai Motor Co.)花了20年时间让欧美用户相信，现代造出的汽车也能与欧美车媲美，现在它又有了宏伟的计划，想吸引富有的宝马(BMW)和雷克萨斯(Lexus)买家购买其首款豪华车型。
After spending 20 years trying to convince Americans and Europeans that Hyundai could build cars as good as their own, South Korea's largest car maker has grand plans to woo the affluent buyers of BMW and Lexus to the company's first luxury models.
现代推出了一款名为Genesis的新车，将于周二在韩国发布，在美国上市的时间则为今年6月。凭借这款车，现代大胆跃入了已拥挤不堪的高端轿车市场。这个细分市场中的轿车售价在3万美元以上，质量毋庸多言，而车的形象也更为重要。
With a new sedan called Genesis, which will be launched in South Korea today and in the U.S. in June, Hyundai Motor Co. is boldly jumping into the market for $30,000-plus sedans, a crowded field where quality is a given and image matters much more.
现代表示，将尽力说服客户购买其第一款后轮驱动的Genesis汽车，宣称该款车的性能堪比德国豪华轿车品牌，而价格较后者低廉。虽然最终的定价尚未确定，但Genesis的起价预计会在3万至3.4万美元的区间内，而宝马3系轿车起价则为4万至4.4万美元。包括旗下子公司起亚(Kia)在内，现代的产量在全世界汽车厂商中排名第六。
Hyundai, the world's No. 6 car maker by volume,including its Kia subsidiary, says it will try to persuade customers to buy the Genesis, its first rear-wheel-drive vehicle, by touting that its performance is comparable to German luxury brands and its price is lower. While final pricing hasn't been set, Genesis is expected to start in the low $30,000 range, compared with the low $40,000s for a BMW AG 3-series sedan.
但现代也冒着巨大的风险。首先，在现代采取行动的今年，美国的汽车销量预计将下跌5%左右，而美国是全球最大的汽车市场，也是现代除韩国之外最重要的市场。
But Hyundai is taking a huge risk. For a start, the company is making the move in a year when sales in the U.S., the world's largest car market and Hyundai's second-most important after Korea, are expected to drop by about 5%.
除此而外，现代以自己的名字推出这款汽车，而没有像丰田汽车(Toyota Motor Corp.)的雷克萨斯和日产汽车(Nissan Motor Co.)的Infiniti那样，推出一个新的高级轿车专用品牌。这样是在冒险，赌自己能让高端买家相信现代这个品牌的名声会越来越好。
What's more, Hyundai is offering the vehicle under its own name rather than starting a new premium-focused brand, as Toyota Motor Corp. did with Lexus and Nissan Motor Co. did with Infiniti. It is gambling that an upscale buyer can be persuaded that the reputation of the Hyundai name is rising.
现代美国分公司负责市场营销的副总裁乔尔?伊万尼克(Joel Ewanick)说：“我们要将这款车放在现代家族中。它从根本上表达了现代真正的形象。”
'We're going to keep it in the Hyundai family,' says Joel Ewanick, vice president of marketing for Hyundai's U.S. unit. 'It's the ultimate expression of what Hyundai really stands for.'
现代今年将大大增加利润较低的小型车生产，并力图实现全球销量增长19%的目标，在这种情况下，Genesis就成为其提高利润宏伟战略的组成部分。分析师说，上述销售目标有点过于激进了，因为韩国市场基本持平，而美国市场还在下滑。
For Hyundai, the Genesis is part of an ambitious strategy to help drive profits in a year when it is sharply boosting production of low-margin small cars and targeting a 19% increase in unit sales world-wide. That sales target is aggressive when the Korean market is flat and the U.S. is falling, analysts say.
Good Morning Shinhan Securities的资深分析师Kevin Lee说：“高油价令人们更关心燃油效率，因此现代必须将重点放在中小型轿车的销售上。”Genesis的利润率在20%左右，Lee表示这款车会平衡现代在小型车及印度和东欧等发展中市场的扩张。
'The high oil price is making people more interested in fuel efficiency, so Hyundai has to focus on selling mid-sized and small cars,' says Kevin Lee, senior analyst at Good Morning Shinhan Securities. With profit margins of about 20%, Mr. Lee says Genesis counterbalances Hyundai's expansion in small cars and developing markets like India and Eastern Europe.
但这种“只要造出来就有人买”的想法曾经有过事与愿违的时候。就在去年，现代就没能达到利用美国、南亚和欧洲市场容量扩张的机会实现大幅增长的既定销售目标。
But that kind of build-it-and-they-will-come ambition has backfired before for Hyundai. Just last year, the company missed an aggressive sales goal created to take advantage of expanded capacity in the U.S., South Asia and Europe.
虽然近年来现代汽车的质量已经赢得好评，但它仍然要靠优惠措施和向车辆租赁公司销售来清空存货。尽管去年美国市场总体销售不佳，现代的市场份额还是实现了增长，但在第四季度，现代在阿拉巴马的一个刚投产一年的工厂因产大于销而停产两周，这种举措在新开的工厂很少见。
Despite achieving high scores for quality in recent years, Hyundai's had to rely on incentives and sales to rental agencies to clear inventories. In the U.S., Hyundai gained market share in a year of lower overall sales, but it idled a year-old factory in Alabama for two weeks in the fourth quarter -- a rare step for a new facility -- because production got ahead of sales.
现在，中国的制造厂商正在崛起，其方式与现代在20世纪八、九十年代所用的一样，因此现代没有别的选择，只能进军高端市场。
With China's manufacturers now starting to rise in the same way Hyundai did in the 1980s and 1990s, the company had little choice but to push upmarket.
为了Genesis，现代在韩国建设了一家大型工厂，并极力敦促供应商制造高质量的零部件，在某些方面还超过了宝马和梅塞德斯-奔驰(Mercedes-Benz)的制造商戴姆勒公司(Daimler AG)等厂商要求的规格。现代研究和产品开发主管Lee Hyun-soon说：“我们以雷克萨斯为标杆，还有宝马5系和梅塞德斯的E系车型。”
For Genesis, Hyundai built a giant factory in South Korea and pushed its suppliers hard to create parts that, in some cases, exceed the specifications sought by manufacturers such as BMW and Daimler AG, maker of Mercedes-Benz cars. 'We used Lexus as a benchmark, together with the BMW 5 series and Mercedes E class cars,' says Lee Hyun-soon, Hyundai's chief of research and product development.
汽车音响供应商Harman/Becker设计了Genesis的整合驾驶信息系统和立体声音响。Harman/Becker副总裁特德?梅杰(Ted Metzger)说，该系统将使用Lexicon品牌，此前Harman只在劳斯莱斯(Rolls Royce)车中使用这个品牌。
Car-audio supplier Harman/Becker designed the integrated driver information system and stereo in Genesis. The system is getting the Lexicon brand that Harman previously used only with Rolls Royce, says Ted Metzger, a Harman/Becker vice president.
现代对这款车极为自信，让记者、经销商和供应商试驾Genesis，与梅塞德斯和宝马的车型进行对比。这款车的内部隔音良好，其安全和稳定控制系统堪比其他豪华轿车品牌。
Hyundai has so much confidence in the car that it has been allowing journalists, dealers and suppliers to drive Genesis on its test track against models from Mercedes and BMW. The car is pindrop-quiet inside and has the same advanced safety and stability controls as other luxury brands.
Genesis是现代过去几年中推出的一系列高档车型中最新的一款，该系列从雅尊(Azera)开始，去年的Veracruz SUV是第一款定价3万美元以上、主要在美国销售的车型。
Genesis is the latest in a series of successively more expensive cars from Hyundai over the past few years, starting with the Azera sedan, and followed by last year's Veracruz SUV, its first car to predominantly sell for more than $30,000 in the U.S.
但Genesis也给现代带来了营销方面的极大挑战，尤其是在美国市场。现代在美国一直将自己定位为比丰田和本田汽车(Honda Motor Co.)等日本品牌价格更低廉的选择。其经销商网络规模较小，也很少有自己的销售点。在展厅里，现代通常也是二、三线品牌。
But Genesis poses a huge marketing challenge for Hyundai, particularly in the U.S. where the company has long positioned itself as a less-expensive option to Japanese manufacturers such as Toyota and Honda Motor Co. Its dealer network is smaller and its cars tend to be offered in few places on their own. Hyundai is often the second or third brand in a showroom.
这与大多在专用展厅销售的高档汽车形象背道而驰。在现代，Genesis只会被在展厅里占据一块特别装饰的单独地盘。
That runs counter to the image of upscale cars, which mostly are sold in exclusive showrooms. At Hyundai, Genesis will merely be placed in a separate part of the showroom with different decor.
过去几个月，现代在美国进行了名为“想想看”(Think About It)的广告宣传活动，试图重塑人们对现代汽车的看法，将它说成既省钱又明智的选择。在一幅平面广告中，现代打出的标题是“这个标志是告诉你，这辆车如何，而非你是谁”，此举向汽车形象的重要性发起了挑战，品牌形象是高档轿车至关重要的一个因素。
In the U.S. over the past few months, the company's 'Think About It' advertising campaign tried to reframe a Hyundai purchase as not just money-saving but smart. In a print ad in the campaign, under the headline 'The logo is there to tell you what the car is, not who you are,' Hyundai challenged the importance of image, a key premise of premium branding.
现代如何继续推进这一讯息将在今年晚些时候Genesis在美国上市前决定。伊万尼克正在拟定奢侈产品销售常用的营销活动，包括在现代经销商那里举行Genesis到货的庆祝活动，只接待受到邀请的来宾，以此营造一种专享的气氛。
Just how far Hyundai pushes that message will be determined later this year, closer to when U.S. sales begin for Genesis. Mr. Ewanick is drawing up marketing events that are common for selling a luxury product. That includes creating an air of exclusivity by hosting invited customers for special Genesis arrival events at Hyundai dealers.
在现代占市场主导地位的韩国，Genesis轿车及其未来的车型将作为单独的品牌销售，其标志是一个翼型图案。在一个电视广告中，现代刻画了Genesis轿车以100公里的时速撞上一辆奥迪A8的情形。两辆车都变形扭曲，几乎无法辨认──在习惯于认为本国产品质量较次的韩国市场，这个广告传达出了强有力的讯息。
In South Korea, where Hyundai dominates the market, the company will sell the sedan and future Genesis models as a separate brand, marked by a winged logo. In a TV commercial, Hyundai depicts the Genesis sedan in a 100-kilometers-an-hour crash against an Audi A8. Both the German car and the Korean one end up crumpled, almost indistiguishable -- a strong message for a market conditioned to believe domestic products are inferior.
Evan Ramstad
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